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A prayer of Habakkuk - o. The "prayer" of the prophet, in the strictest sense of the word, is contained in the words of Habakkuk 3:2. The rest is, in its form, praise and thanksgiving, chiefly for God's past mercies in the deliverance from Egypt and the entering into the promised land. But thanksgiving is an essential part of prayer, and Hannah is said to have "prayed," whereas the hymn which followed is throughout one thanksgiving . In that also these former deliverances were images of things to come, of every deliverance afterward, and, especially, of that complete divine deliverance which our Lord Jesus Christ performed for us from the power of Satan 1 Corinthians 10:11, the whole is one prayer: "Do, O Lord, as Thou hast done of old; forsake not Thine own works. Such were Thy deeds once; fulfill them now, all which they shadowed forth." It is then a prayer for the manifestation of God's power, and therewith the destruction of His enemies, thenceforth to the Day of Judgment. Cyril: "Having completed the discourse about Babylon, and having fore-announced most clearly, that those who destroyed the holy city and carried Israel captive shall be severely punished, he passes suitably to the mystery of Christ, and from the redemption which took place partially in one nation, he carries on the discourse to that universal redemption, whereby the remnant of Israel, and no less the whole world has been saved."

Upon Shigionoth - The title, "Shiggaion," occurs only once besides Psalm 7. Upon, in the titles of the Psalms, is used with the instrument , the melody , or the first words of the hymn, whose melody has been adopted The two first are mentioned by a Jewish Commentator (Tanchum) with others, "in his delight," or "his errors," in the sense, that God will forgive them. This, which the versions and Jewish commentators mostly adopt, would be a good sense, but is hardly consistent with the Hebrew usage. "Shiggaion of David," as a title of a Psalm, must necessarily describe the Psalm itself, as "Mismor of David," "Michtam of David," "Tephillah of David," "Maschil of David." But "Shiggaion," as a "great error," is not a title: nor does it suit the character of the Psalm, which relates to calumny not to error.

It probably, then, means a psalm with music expressive of strong emotion, "erratic" or "dithyrambic." Habakkuk's title, on Shigionoth (plural) then would mean upon, or (as we should say,) "set to" music of psalms of this sort The number "three" remarkably predominates in this psalm (Habakkuk 3:6 has 15 words, in five combinations of three words; Habakkuk 3:3, Habakkuk 3:10 have 12 words, in four 3's: Habakkuk 3:4, Habakkuk 3:9, Habakkuk 3:19 have 9 words in three 3's: Habakkuk 3:5, Habakkuk 3:12, Habakkuk 3:15, Habakkuk 3:18 have 6 words in two 3's: Habakkuk 3:17 is divided into 4-3-3-4-3-3; Habakkuk 3:8 is 3-3-3-3-2; Habakkuk 3:11 is 4-3-3; Habakkuk 3:16 is 3-3-3-2-2-2-3. This forces itself on every reader. Delitzsch quotes the Meor. Enaim, i. 60, "The prayer of Habakkuk goeth on three's") yet so that long measures are succeeded by very short.

O Lord, I have heard - i. e., with the inward ear of the heart, "Thy speech," (rather as English margin, Thy report, i. e., the report of Thee) i. e., what may he heard and known of God, or, what he had himself heard . The word contains in one both what God had lately declared to the prophet, the judgments of God upon the wicked of the people, and upon those who, with their own injustice, done upon them the righteous judgments of God, and that the work of the Lord would be performed in His time for those who in patience wait for it; and also still more largely, what might be heard of God, although, as it were, but a little whisper of His greatness and of the majesty of His workings.

And was afraid - not "fearful" but "afraid in awe," as a creature, and amazed at the surpassing wonderfulness of the work of God. Well may man stand in awe "at the incarnation of the only-begotten Son, how earth should contain Him uncontained by space, how a body was prepared for Him of the virgin by the Holy Spirit, and all the works whereby He shall work the salvation of mankind, the cross, the death, resurrection and ascension, uniting things opposite, a body with one incorporeal, death with life, resurrection with death, a body in heaven. All is full of wonder and awe." Rup.: "This is not a servile fear, but a holy fear which endureth forever, not one which 'love casteth out,' but which it bringeth in, wherein angels praise, dominions adore, powers stand in awe at the majesty of the Eternal God."

O Lord, revive Thy work - God's Word seems, often, as it were, dead and "come utterly to an end for evermore" Psalm 77:8, while it is holding on its own course, as all nature seems dead for a while, but all is laid up in store, and ready to shoot forth, as by a sort of resurrection Rup.: "The prophet prophesying prayeth, that it should come quickly, and praying prophesieth that it shall so come." All God's dealings with His people, His Church, each single soul, are part of one great work, perfect in itself Deuteronomy 32:4; glory and majesty Psalm 140:3; all which the godly meditateth on Psalm 77:3; Psalm 143:5; which those busied with their own plans, do not look to Isaiah 5:12; it is manifested in great doings for them or with them, as in the Exodus the Psalmist says, "We have heard with our ears, yea, our fathers have told us what work Thou didst in their days, in the times of old" Psalm 44:2; "They proved Me and saw My work" Psalm 95:9; with it He makes His own glad Psalm 92:3; after it has been withdrawn for a while, "He sheweth it to His servants" Psalm 90:6; it issues in judgments on the ungodly, which people consider and declare .

The great work of God on earth, which includes all His works and is the end of all, is the salvation of man through Jesus Christ. This great work seemed, as it were, asleep, or dead, as trees in winter, all through those 4,000 years, which gave no token of His coming. Included in this great work is the special work of the Hand of God, of which alone it is said, "God said, Let Us make man in Our image after Our Likeness" Genesis 1:26; and, "we are the clay and Thou our Potter, and we are all the work of Thy Hands" Isaiah 64:8; and "Thy Hands have made me and fashioned me together round about" Job 10:8, man; whom, being dead as to the life of the soul through the malice of Satan, Christ revived by dying and rising again. He was "dead in trespasses and sins," and like a carcass putrefying in them, and this whole world one great charnel-house, through man's manifold corruptions, when Christ came to awaken the dead, and they who heard lived John 5:25.

Again, the Center of this work, the special Work of God, that wherein He made all things new, is the Human Body of our Lord, the Temple which was destroyed by death, and within three days was raised up.

The answer to Habakkuk's enquiry, "How long?" had two sides: It had given assurance as to the end. The trial-time would not be prolonged for one moment longer than the counsel of God had fore-determined. The relief would "come, come; it would not be behind-hand." But meantime? There was no comfort to be given. For God knew that deepening sin was drawing on deepening chastisement. But in that He was silent as to the intervening time and pointed to patient expectation of a lingering future, as their only comfort, He implies that the immediate future was heavy. Habakkuk then renews his prayer for the years which had to intervene and to pass away. "In the midst of the years," before that "time appointed" , when His promise should have its full fulfillment, before those years should come to their close, he prays; "revive Thy work." The years include all the long period of waiting for our Lord's first coming before He came in the Flesh; and now for His second coming and the "restitution of all things." in this long period, at times God seems to be absent, as when our Lord was asleep in the boat, while the tempest was raging; at times He bids "the storm to cease and there is a great calm."

This, in those long intervals, when God seems to be absent, and to leave all things to time and chance, and love waxes cold, and graces seem rare, is the prayer of Habakkuk, of prophets and Psalmists, of the Church Psalm 80:14, "Return, we beseech Thee, O God of hosts, look down from heaven, behold and visit this vine Psalm 74:1, Psalm 74:11-12. O God, why hast Thou cast us off forever? Why withdrawest Thou Thy hand, Thy right hand? For God is my king of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth. Isaiah 51:9-10 awake, awake, put on strength, Thou Arm of the Lord; awake, as in the ancient days, in the generations of old. Art thou not It which did smite Rahab, didst wound the dragon? Art thou not It which didst dry the sea, the waters of the great deep, which didst make the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over? Psalm 80:3. Stir up Thy might and come, save us Lamentations 5:21. Renew our days, as of old." So our Lord taught His Church to pray continually, whenever she prayed, "Thy kingdom come," longing not for His final coming only, but for the increase of His glory, and the greater dominion of His grace, and His enthronement in the hearts of people, even before its complete and final coming. "In the midst of the years revive Thy work," is the Church's continual cry.

In the midst of the years make known - literally, "Thou wilt make known: in wrath Thou wilt remember mercy;" and so (as we use the word "wilt") the prophet, at once, foretelleth, expresseth his faith, prayeth. God had made known His work and His power in the days of old. In times of trouble He seems "like a God who hideth Himself." Now, he prays Him to shine forth and help; make known Thy work, before Thou fulfill it, to revive the drooping hopes of man, and that all may see that "Thy word is truth." Make Thyself known in Thy work, that, when the time cometh to Daniel 9:24 "make an end of sin" by the Death of Thy Son, Thy Awful Holiness, and the love wherewith Thou hast John 3:16 "so loved the world," may be the more known and adored.

In wrath Thou wilt remember mercy - So David prayed Psalm 25:6, "Remember Thy tender-mercies and Thy loving-kindnesses; for they are from old." "Thou wilt remember" that counsel for man's redemption which has been from the foundation of the world: for we seem in our own minds to be forgotten of God, when He delayeth to help us. God remembereth mercy Luke 1:54, Luke 1:72 in anger, in that in this life He never chastens without purposes of mercy, and His Mercy ever softeneth His judgments. His Promise of mercy, that the Seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head, went before the sentence of displeasure Genesis 3:19, "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." Jerome: "He reveals His wrath that He may scare us from sin and so may not inflict it;" and when at last He inflicteth it, He hath mercy on the remnant who flee to His Mercy, that we be not like Sodom and Gomorrah. Romans 5:8, "while we were yet sinners," and God was angry, "Christ died for us," and, Titus 3:5, "He saved us, not for works which we had done, but out of His great Mercy," and took away sin, and restored us to life and interruption.

God had already promised by Micah M1 Corinthians 7:15, "According to the days of thy coming out of the land of Egypt, I will show him marvelous things." Isaiah had often used the great events of that deliverance as the symbols of the future. So now Habakkuk, in one vast panorama, as it were, without distinction of time or series of events, exhibits the future in pictures of the past. In the description itself which follows, he now speaks in the past, now in the future; of which times the future might be a vivid present; and the past a prophetic past. As a key to the whole, he says, "God shall come," indicating that all which follows, however spoken, was a part of that future. In no other way was it an answer to that prayer, "Revive Thy work." To foretell future deliverances in plain words, had been a comfort; it would have promised a continuance of that work. The unity and revival of the work is expressed, in that the past is made, as it was, the image of the future. That future was to be wondrous, superhuman; elsewhere the past miracles had been no image of it. It was to be no mere repetition of the future; and to mark this, the images are exhibited out of their historical order.

God came - literally, shall come

From Teman - "God shall come," as He came of old, clothed with majesty and power; but it was not mere power. The center of the whole picture is, as Micah and Isaiah had prophesied that it was to be, a new revelation Isa 2:3; Micah 4:2 : "The law shall go forth from Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem." Isaiah 44:5, "I will give Thee for a covenant to the people (Israel), for a light of the Gentiles." So now, speaking of the new work in store, Habakkuk renews the imagery in the Song of Moses Deuteronomy 33:2, in Deborah's Song Judges 5:5, and in David; Psalm 68:7 but there the manifestation of His glory is spoken of wholly in time past, and Mount Sinai is named. Habakkuk speaks of that coming as yet to be, and omits the express mention of Mount Sinai, which was the emblem of the law . And so he directs us to another Lawgiver, whom God should raise up like unto Moses Deuteronomy 18:15-18, yet with a law of life, and tells how He who spake the law, God, shall come in likeness of our flesh. And the Holy One from Mount Paran In the earliest passage three places are mentioned, in which or from which the glory of God was manifested; with this difference however, that it is said Deuteronomy 33:2, The Lord came from Sinai, but His glory arose, as we should say "dawned" unto them from Seir, and flashed forth from Mount Paran Seir and Mount Paran are joined together by the symbol of the light which dawned or shone forth from them. In the second passage, the Song of Deborah, Seir and the field of Edom are the place whence God came forth; Sinai melted Judges 5:4-5 at His presence.

In Psalm 68 the mention of Edom is dropped; and the march through the wilderness under the leading of God, is alone mentioned, together with the shaking of Sinai. In Habakkuk, the contrast is the same as in Moses; only Tehran stands in place of Seir . Theman and Mount Paran are named probably, as the two opposed boundaries of the journeyings of Israel through the desert. They came to Mount Sinai through the valley, now called Wady Feiran or Paran; Edom was the bound of their wanderings to their promised land Numbers 20:14-20; Deuteronomy 2. God who guided, fed, protected them from the beginning, led them to the end. Between Paran also and Edom or Teman was the gift of the Spirit to the seventy, which was the shadow of the day of Pentecost; there, was the brass serpent lifted up, the picture of the healing of the Cross . If Mount Paran is near Kadesh, then Moses in the opening of his song describes the glory of God as manifested from that first revelation of His Law on Mount Sinai; then in that long period of Israel's waiting there to its final departure for the promised land, when Mount Hor was consecrated and God's awful Holiness declared in the death of Aaron.

He who "shall come," is God , "the Holy One" (a proper name of gods) . Perfect in Holiness, as God, the Son of God, and as Man also all-holy, with a human will, always exactly accompanying the Divine Will, which was:

"The passion of His Heart

Those Three-and-thirty years."

On this there follows a pause denoted by "Selah" (which occurs thrice according to the mystery of that number,) that the soul may dwell on the greatness of the majesty and mercy of God.

Selah - There is no doubt as to the general purport of the word, that it is a musical direction, that there should be a pause, the music probably continuing alone, while the mind rested upon the thought, which had just been presented to it; our "interlude" . It is always placed at some pause of thought, even when not at the end of a strophe, or, as twice in this hymn , at the end of the verse.

Gregory of Nyssa modifies this thought, supposing "Selah" to express a pause made by the writer, that "while the psalmody, with which David's prophesying was accompanied, went on in its course, another illumining of the Holy Spirit, and an addition to the gift according to knowledge, came for the benefit of those who received the prophecy, he, holding in his verse, gave time for his mind to receive the knowledge of the thought, which took place in him from the divine illumining. He defines it to be "a sudden silence in the midst of the Psalmody for the reception of the illumining."

His Glory covered the heavens, and the earth was full of His praise - This is plainly no created glory, but anticipates the Angelic Hymn Luke 2:14 "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good-will toward men," or, as the Seraphim sing first glory to God in Heaven Isaiah 6:3, "Holy Holy Holy is the Lord God of Sabaoth," and then, the whole earth is full of His glory; and Uncreated Wisdom saith (Ecclesiasticus 24:5), "I alone compassed the circuit of Heaven, and walked in the bottom of the deep." Nor are they our material heavens, much less this lowest heaven over our earth nor is "His glory" any of God, which rules, encompasses, fills, penetrates the orbs of heaven and all its inhabitants, and yet is not enclosed nor bounded thereby. Those who are made as the heavens by the indwelling of God He spiritually "covers," filling them with the light of glory and splendor of grace and brightness of wisdom, as it saith, "Is there any number of His armies, and upon whom doth not His light arise? Job 25:3 and so the earth was full of His praise," i. e., the Church militant spread throughout the world, as in the Psalm Psa 112:3, "The Lord's name is praised from the rising up of the sun unto the going down of the same, and, Psalm 8:1, O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the earth, who hast set Thy glory above the heavens."

and His brightness - that wherein God dwelleth Ezekiel 10:4, "the brightness of the Lord's glory," before which darkness fleeth Psalm 18:12, "was as the light," or as the sun. Out of the midst of the darkness, wherewith God, as it were Exodus 19:9, Exodus 19:16; Exodus 20:21, hid Himself, the brightness of the "inapproachable Light" wherein "He dwelleth," gleams forth Exodus 24:10, bright as the brightest "light" gathered into one, which man knows of and whereon he cannot gaze. So amid the darkness of the humiliation of His presence in the flesh, John 1:14 : "We beheld His glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father;" and, Isaiah 9:2, "the people that walked in darkness see a great light," not dim. Theoph.: "nor weak, nor shadowed, like that of Moses, but pure unimaginable light of the knowledge of God." The brightness too of His flesh was like the light of the Godhead on Mount Tabor; for the Godhead flashed through. Rup.: "As often as He did His marvelous works, He put forth His "brightness" (tempered for His creatures, since they could not approach the depth of His light, yet) as "light" to enlighten people to know Him. Yet the brightness issues from the Light, co-existing with it, and in it, while issuing from it. And so the words aptly express, how He who is the, Hebrews 1:3, "brightness of the Father's Glory and the express Image of His Person." Wisdom Hebrews 7:25, "brightness of the eternal light, the unspotted mirror of the power of God, and the image of His goodness," is as the Light from whom He is. Nicene Creed: "Light of Light," Equal to the Father by whom He was begotten. As John says in John 1:9 : "That was the true Light, which lighteneth every man that cometh into the world." As He prayeth in John 17:5, "Glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was."

He had horns coming out of His Hand - Jerome Dion: "Horns are everywhere in Holy Scripture the emblem of strength." It may be, that here "rays" are likened to horns, as the face of Moses is said, with the same image, to have "sent forth rays" after he had long been in the presence of God. So it may be a mingled image of the Glory and might; Light, which was also might. But "horns," though they may be a symbol of "light," are not of "lightning;" and the Hand of God is used as an emblem of His power, His protection, His bounty, His constraining force on His prophets. It is nowhere used of the side or sides. We have two images combined here; "horns" which in every other place in which they are used as a metaphor, is an emblem of power; and "from the hand of" which, wherever it is used of a person, means that the thing spoken of had been in his hand or power really or virtually. Both then combine in the meaning that the might came forth from the directing agency of God who wielded it.

When then did light or might, which lay, as it were, before in the hand of God, go forth from it? For "the hand of God" is always symbolic of His might, whether put forth, or for the time laid up in it. The form of the words remarkably corresponds to those of Moses, in the preface to the blessing on the tribes, which Habakkuk had in mind Deuteronomy 33:2, "From His right hand was a fiery law for them," and Paul says that the glory of Moses' face which he received from the Presence of God, was a symbol of the glory of the law. 2 Corinthians 3:7 says, "The ministration of death written and engraven on stone was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance." The law, being given by God, had a majesty of its own. The Psalms bear witness to its power in converting, enwisening, rejoicing, enlightening the soul Psalm 19:8. They in whose heart it was, none of their steps slipped Psalm 37:31. The whole 119th Psalm is one varied testimony of its greatness and its power. It was a guide on the way; it was a schoolmaster unto Christ Galatians 3:24, by whom it was fulfilled. But itself bare witness of the greater glory which should come forth from the Hand of God. 2 Corinthians 3:11 states, "If that which is done away were glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious." Cyril: "The horn signifieth power, when it is spoken of God the Father exhibiting to us God the Son, Luke 2:69, 'He hath raised up a horn of salvation for us,' and again, Psalm 111:9, 'His horn shall be exalted in honor.' For all things which were marvelously done were glorious. The only-begotten One then came in our form, and, in regard to the flesh and the manhood, enduring the appearance of our weakness, but, as God, invisible in might and easily subduing whom He willed."

And what has been the weapon of His warfare, whereby He has subdued the might of Satan and the hearts of people, but "the horns" of His cross, whereto His sacred hands were once fastened by the sharp nails, where was the "hiding of His Power," when His almightiness lay hid in His passion Isaiah 53:3, and He was Psalm 22:6 "a worm and no man; a reproach of men and the despised of the people?" Now it is the scepter laid upon His shoulder Isaiah 9:6, the ensign and trophy of His rule, the rod of His strength Psalm 110:2, terrible to devils, salvation to mankind. In it lay His might, although concealed, as He said, "The words, horns are in His hands, show the insignia of His kingdom, by which horns, pushing and thrusting the invisible and opposing powers, He drove them away." Eusebius Dem. Evang. vi. 15. Add Cyprian Test. ad Quirin. ii. 21. p. 57. Oxford Translation: "The horns in His hands, what are they but the trophy of the cross?"

Augustine, de Civ. Dei xviii. 32), "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Me" John 12:32. His Might was lodged there, although hidden. It was "the hiding-place of His power." The cross was, 1 Corinthians 1:23-24, "to the Jews a stumbling-block, and unto the Greeks foolishness; but unto them which are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ crucified was the Power of God and the Wisdom of God." Through the Cross was, Matthew 28:18, "all power given to Him both in Heaven and earth." Daniel 7:14 : "there was given Him dominion and glory and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages should serve Him." From Him shall go forth all power in earth; by His hands shall be given the vacant thrones in Heaven, as He says in Revelation 3:21, "To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with Me in My Throne, even as I also overcame and am set down with My Father in His Throne." There too was the hiding of His Power, in that there, in His Cross, is our shelter , and in His pierced Side our hiding place, where we may take refuge from Satan and our sins; for therein is power.

Consider John 10:28, "Neither shall any pluck them out of My Hand." Light and darkness always meet in God. His inapproachable light is darkness to eyes which would gaze on it. Psalm 104:2, "he covereth Himself with Light as with a garmemt." His light is the very veil which hideth Him. His Light is darkness to those who pry into Him and His Nature; His darkness is light to those who by faith behold Him. He "emptied Himself" Philippians 2:8 and hid Himself; He hid the power of His Godhead in the weakness of the Manhood, and so, 2 Corinthians 4:6, "He who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the Face of Jesus Christ." Jerome: "In the Cross was for a while His might hidden, when He said to His Father, Matthew 26:38-39, 'My soul is exceeding sorrowful even unto death, and, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me,' and on the Cross itself, Luke 23:13, 'Father, into Thy Hands I commend My Spirit. '"

Before Him went (goeth) the pestilence - then to consume His enemies. Exodus 23:27 : "I will send My fear before thee, and will destroy all the people, to whom thou shalt come," and the lightnings are a token that, Psalm 68:1-2, "they which hate Him, flee before Him, and the wicked perish at the Presence of God." So, on His Ascension, Herod and Pilate were smitten by Him, and Elymas and Simon Magus before His apostles, and whatsoever hath lifted itself up against Him hath perished, and antichrist shall perish, Psalm 11:4, "at the breath of His mouth," and all the ungodly on the Day of Judgment.

And burning coals - rather, as English, "burning fever", Deuteronomy 32:2. (where also it is singular, as only beside in רשׁף בני benēy resheph Job 5:7.) So A. E., "burning coals" is from Kimchi, Tanchum gives as different opinions "sparks" or "arrows" or "pestilence;" but the meanings "sparks, arrows," are ascribed only to the plural. Psalm 76:4; Psalm 88:48; Sol 8:6. The central meaning is probably "burning heat."

Went forth at his feet - i. e., followed Him. Messengers of death went as it were before Him, as the front of His army, and the rear thereof was other forms of death Death and destruction of all sorts are a great army at His command, going before Him as heralds of His Coming (such as are judgments in this world) or attendants upon Him, at the judgment when He appeareth 2 Timothy 6:1. in His kingdom, when, Matthew 13:51, Matthew 13:42, "they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity, and shall cast them into a furnace of fire."

He stood - It is "a metaphor of his giving victory to Israel" Tanchum.

And measured - So Kimchi, A. E., Rashi, Tanchum, Vulgate. It is borne out by Hithpolel. "extended himself," 1 Kings 17:21. By an interchange of dentals; מוד might be equals מוט, and so the Aramaic and the Septuagint but in no other case do the two forms co-exist in Hebrew.

The earth - Joshua, after he had conquered the land, meted it out and divided it among the people. He who should come, should measure out the earth in its length and breadth, that earth which His glory filleth. "He stood," as Stephen saw Him, Acts 7:56, "standing at the right hand of God." Isaiah saith, Isaiah 3:13 : "The Lord standeth up to plead, and standeth to judge the people." He had not need to go forth, but, in the abode of His glory, "He stood" and beheld and with His eye "measured the earth," as His own, whereas, before the cross, it lay under 1 Corinthians 2:5, "the Prince of this world," and he had said, Luke 4:6, "it is delivered unto me, and unto whomsoever I will, I give it." "He measureth it," and gave it to His apostles. Mat 28:18; Mark 16:15 : "all power is given unto Me in heaven and in earth. Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature," and, Psalm 19:4, "their sound is gone out into all lands, and their words into the ends of the world." He measureth it also, surveying and weighing all who dwell therein, their persons, qualities, deeds, good or bad, to requite them, as "Judge of quick and dead;" as David cast down Moab and measured them with a line, 2 Samuel 8:2, "to put to death and to keep alive."

He beheld, and drove asunder the nations - or, "made the nations to tremble." When Israel came out of Egypt and God divided the Red Sea before them, they sang: Exodus 15:15-16 "The people shall hear and be afraid; terror shall take hold of the inhabitants of Palestine; the mighty men of Moab, trembling shall take hold of them; all the inhabitants of Canaan shall melt away; fear and dread shall fall on them; by the greatness of Thy power they shall be still as a stone." Fear and awe were to be renewed. All nearness of God brings terror to sinful man. When the news came through the wise men, that they had, Matthew 2:1-3, "seen in the East the star of Him who was born, King of the Jews," not only was Herod the King troubled, but "all Jerusalem with him." Pilate John 19:8 "was afraid" when he condemned Jesus; the high priests wondered "whereunto this should grow," and expostulated, Acts 5:24, Acts 5:28, "ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this Man's blood upon us." Pagandom was as a beleaguered city, mastered by an ubiquitous Presence, which they knew not how to meet . "The state is beset: the Christians are in their fields. in their forts, in their islands. Every sex, age, condition, and now even rank is going over to this sect." The fierceness of the persecutions was the measure of their fear. They put forth all human might to stamp out the spark, lest their gods, and the greatness of the empire which they ascribed to their gods, should fall before this unknown Power.

And the everlasting mountains were scattered; the perpetual hills did bow - all power, great or small, gave way before Him. All which withstood was scattered asunder, all which in pride lifted itself up was brought low, although before the coming of the Saviour it had ever gone with neck erect, and none could humble its pride. There is something so marvelous about those ancient mountains. There they stood before man was on the earth; they are so solid, man so slight; they have survived so many generations of man; they will long survive us; they seem as if they would stand forever; nothing could stand before the might of God. What symbol could be more apt? To the greater pride the heavier lot is assigned; the mountains lifted on high above the earth and, as it were, looking down upon it, are scattered or dispersed, as when a stone flieth in pieces under the stroke of the hammer. The "hills" are bowed down only; and this may be the pride of man humbled under the yoke of Christ.

His ways are everlasting - "Everlasting" is set over against "everlasting." The "everlasting" of the creature, that which had been as long as creation had been, co-existing with its whole duration, its most enduring parts, are as things past and gone; "the everlasting mountains, the hills of eternity," have been scattered in pieces and bowed, and are no more. Over against these stands the everpresent eternity of God. "His ways are everlasting," ordered everlastingly, existing everlastingly in the Divine Mind, and, when in act among us, without change in Him. The prophet blends in these great words, things seemingly contrary, ways which imply progress, eternity which is unchangeable "God ever worketh, and ever resteth; unchangeable, yet changing all; He changeth His works, His purpose unchanged" . "For Thou art Most High, and art not changed, neither in Thee doth today come to a close; yet in Thee it doth come to a close; because all such things also are in Thee. For they had no way to pass away, unless Thou heldest them together. 'And since Thy years fail not,' Thy years are one Today. How many of our's and our fathers' years have flowed away through Thy today; and from it received the measure and the mould of such being as they had; and still others shall flow away, and so receive the mould of their degree of being. But Thou art still the Same; and all things of tomorrow, and all beyond, and all of yesterday, and all behind it, Thou wilt do in this today, Thou hast done in this today"

To these His goings, a highway is made by the breaking down of all which exalted itself, as Isaiah had said, "The loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be made low and the Lord Alone shall be exalted in that day" Isaiah 2:17; and "The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low" Isaiah 40:3.

Bernard in Ps. Qui habitat. Serra. xi. 8: "The Everlasting ways of the Everlasting God are Mercy and Truth, by these Ways are the hills of the world and the proud demons, the princes of the darkness of this world, bowed down, who knew not the way of mercy and truth nor remembered its paths. What hath he to do with truth, who is a liar and the father of it, and of whom it is written, 'he abode not in the Truth?' But how far he is from Mercy, our misery witnesseth, inflicted on us by him. When was he ever merciful, 'who was a murderer from the beginning?' So then those swelling hills were bowed down from the Everlasting Ways, when through their own crookedness they sunk away from the straight ways of the Lord, and became not so much ways as precipices. How much more prudently and wisely are other hills bowed down and humbled by these ways to salvation! For they were not bowed from them, as parting from their straightness, but the Everlasting Ways themselves bowed down. May we not now see the hills of the world bowed down, when those who are high and mighty with devoted submission bow themselves before the Lord. and worship at His Feet? Are they not bowed down, when from their own destructive loftiness of vanity and cruelty, they are turned to the humble way of mercy and truth?"

I saw - in prophetic vision 1 Kings 22:17.

The tents of Cushan in (under) affliction - Upon the coming of the Lord there follows the visitation of those alien from Him. . Cushan-Rishathaim was the first, whose ambition God overruled to chasten His people Judges 3:8-10.. It has been remarked that as "king of Aram-Naharaim" or North Mesopotamia, he was probably sovereign of the Aram, from which Balak king of Moab, allied with Midian, sent for Balaam to curse Israel. Midian was the last enemy who, at the very entrance of the promised land, seduced God's people into idolatry and foul sin and lusts. Midian became then the object of the wrath of God Numbers 25:17. They were also among the early oppressors of Israel, leaving Judges 6:4, Judges 6:11. "no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep nor ox nor ass," driving them for refuge to dwell in the "dens and the mountains, caves and fastnesses," consuming the produce of their land like locusts, so that he whom God raised up as their subduer, was threshing even in a wine-press to hide it from them.

Both the kingdom of Aram-Naharaim and Midian disappear from history after those great defeats. Midian, beside its princes Judges 8:10. "lost," by mutual slaughter, "one hundred and twenty thousand men who drew sword." It left its name as a proverb for the utter destruction of these who sought to exterminate the people of God. Psalm 83:9, Psalm 83:11-12. "Do unto them as unto the Midianites; make them and their princes like Oreb and Zeeb; all their princes us Zebah and as Zalmunnah, who said, let us take to ourselves the houses of God in possession." It was an exterminating warfare, which rolled back on those who waged it. So Isaiah sums up an utter breaking-off of the yoke and the rod of the oppressor, as being Isaiah 9:4 "as in the day of Midian." The same word, aven, is nothingness, iniquity, and the fruit of iniquity, trouble (Job 5:6; Job 26:14; Jeremiah 4:15; Hosea 9:4; not in Psalm 55:4; nor (as Gesenius) in Job 4:8; Psalm 22:8; Isaiah 59:4.) (since iniquity is emptiness and opposed to that which is, God and His Goodness, and ends in sorrow); so then Cushan is seen as lying as all sinners do, weighed down by and under what is very "emptiness."

Tents and curtains are emblems of what shall pass away, under which the wicked shelter themselves from the troubles of this present life, as from heat and rain, "but which in themselves decay, and are consumed by fire." "The curtains of Midian tremble." The prophet uses the present to shew that he was not speaking of any mere past terror, but of that terror, which should still seize those opposed to God. The word "wrath" (רגז rôgez) echoes through the hymns; Habakkuk 3:2. here the wicked tremble, רגז râgaz, under it, to perish; afterward the prophet Habakkuk 3:16. to live.

Was the Lord displeased against the rivers? - The prophet asks the question thrice, as to the two miracles of the dividing of the Red Sea and the Jordan River, thereby the more earnestly declaring, that God meant somewhat by these acts and beyond them. He asks, as Daniel Dan 7:16. and Zechariah asked, what was the truth of the things which they saw. God's defilings with His former people were as much ensamples of what should be with us 1 Corinthians 10:11. as the visions shown to the prophets. Hereafter too, there shall be Luke 21:25; Revelation 8:6 "signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity, the sea and the waves roaring;" there shall be deepening plagues upon the sea and the rivers and fountains of waters; and every living soul in the sea shall die Revelation 16:3. But God's purpose therein aforetime was not as to the sea or the rivers, but for the salvation of His elect; so shall it be to the end. Mighty as may be the "mighty waves of the sea" which lift themselves up against the Lord, "mightier on high is the Lord" Psalm 93:4. Jerome: "As Thou didst dry up the Jordan and the Red Sea, fighting for us; for Thou wert not wroth with the rivers or the sea, nor could things without sense offend Thee; so now mounting Thy chariots, and taking Thy bow, Thou wilt give salvation to Thy people; and the oaths which Thou swarest to our fathers and the tribes, Thou wilt fulfill forever."

Thou didst ride upon Thy horses - as though God set His army Psalm 103:12. "the Hosts which do His pleasure," against the armies of earth, as the prophet's servant had his eyes opened to see 2 Kings 6:15. "the mountain was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha." Jerome: "Yet amidst so many thousands of horses and chariots, there was no rider; He was the Rider and Ruler of those horses, of whom the Psalmist says Psalm 80:1. 'Thou that sittest above the Cherubim, shew Thyself.' With such horses and such chariots was Elijah also taken up into Heaven."

And Thy chariots of salvation - literally "Thy chariots are salvation." Not, as in human armies, except as far as they are the armies of God, to destruction. The end of God's armies, His visitations and judgments, is the salvation of His elect, even while they who are inwardly dead, perish outwardly also. Nor, again, do they prepare for the deliverance for which He intends them. With God, to will is to do. His chariots are salvation. His help is present help. His chariots are the tokens and channels of His Presence to aid. And so, they who bore His "Name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel, chosen vessels" to bear it, are, in a yet fuller sense, His chariots, which are salvation. Jerome said that they "are holy souls, upon which the word of God cometh, to save them and others by them Sol 1:9.. 'I have compared thee,' saith the Spouse, 'to a company of horses in Pharaoh's chariots.' However holy the soul, yet compared to God, it is like the chariot of Pharaoh; and a beast, yet still a beast, before Thee." Psalm 73:23.. Yet such an one, as endowed with might and ready obedience, and swiftness and nobleness to bear the Word of God, and through His might whom they bore, not their own, nor making it their own, bearing down everything which opposed itself.

Cyril: "The object of the prophet, is to show that the second dispensation is better and more glorious, and of incomparably better things than the old. For of old He led Israel forth, through the bodily service of Moses, changing into blood the rivers of Egypt, and doing signs and wonders; then dividing the Red Sea, and carrying over the redeemed, and choking in the waters the most warlike of the Egyptians. But when the only-begotten Word of God became Man, He withdrew the whole human race under heaven from the tyranny of Satan, not changing rivers into blood, nor pouring forth His anger upon waters, nor dividing waves of the sea, nor bringing destruction upon people, but rather destroying the murderous Serpent himself, and taking away the sin which had been invented by him and for him, and loosing the unconquered might of death, and calling all to the knowledge of God, through the holy apostles, who, running forth their course under the whole heaven and bearing about the name of Christ, were very rightly had in admiration.

He saith then, O Lord, most worthy to be heard are those things, of which Thou hast Thyself been the Doer, and what Thou hast done anew is far better than what Thou didst through Moses. For Thou wilt not inflict wrath on rivers, nor show Thy might on the sea; not in these things will Thy divine and marvelous power gleam forth, but 'Thou wilt ride upon Thy horses,' and 'Thy chariots are Salvation.' What may these horses be? The blessed disciples, apostles and evangelists, they who took on them wholly the yoke of all His divine will, they, the noble, the obedient, ready for all things, whatsoever should please Him; who had Christ to sit upon them, whereof one is the blessed Paul, of whom Himself saith, Acts 9:15 : 'He is a chosen vessel unto Me, to bear My Name before the Gentiles.' Of fiery speed were these Horses, encompassing the whole earth; so then the chariots of God are said to be 'ten thousand times ten thousand' Psalm 68:17. For countless, each in their times, and after them, became leaders of the people, and subjected the neck of the understanding to the yoke of the Saviour, and bare about His glory throughout the whole earth, and rightly divided the word of truth, and subdued the whole earth, as with the speed of horsemen."

His chariots are salvation - Cyril: "for they ran not in vain, but to save cities and countries and nations together, Christ overthrowing the empires of devils, who, so to speak, divided among themselves the whole earth, subduing its dwellers to their own will."